


Conversation: John Keller and William Lennox

by dragonofdispair



Series: Roads [8]
Category: Transformers (Bay Movies), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-05-01
Updated: 2008-05-01
Packaged: 2018-02-26 16:31:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2658734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonofdispair/pseuds/dragonofdispair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Secretary of Defense gets a few things explained to him… in a horribly cliche empty diner.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Conversation: John Keller and William Lennox

For a moment Keller took the time to watch the big GMC Topkick that was the only other car parked in the diner's small lot. Other than the sense of sheer size that radiated from it, there was nothing unusual about it. It didn't move. It didn't give off the impression that it might move. It sat there, still and quiet.

Keller hadn't met this Autobot in person. He seen Optimus Prime after Mission City and the yellow one, Bumblebee, but hadn't had time to speak to Bumblebee under Hoover Dam. But he'd read the reports. This was Ironhide, the Autobot weapon specialist. He couldn't help feel that Ironhide's presence here was significant. Significant of what, he wasn't going to find out by staying here.

He got out of his car and walked past the Topkick to the diner. The truck ignored him. From a human he'd consider that rude, but he remembered one informal note that one of Lennox's team had added to one of his reports: "It's a cultural thing. If they're pretending to be a car the consider it polite to maintain the deception in public. Occasionally their ideas of 'public' and 'private' don't match ours. You could be totally alone and they'd consider it a public space. So if they're in their vehicle forms and ignoring you, they're only being polite, and the most polite thing for you to do is ignore them back." 

So he took no offense at being ignored by what he knew was another person who was just as aware of him as he was of him.

Sometimes he wished, Keller mused as he walked into the mostly empty diner, that he could have an anthropologist do an in depth cultural study of the Autobots. Earth becoming ground zero for an alien war -- that certainly wouldn't confine itself to the United States -- was going to be tricky enough without alienating (no pun intended) their allies. But he wasn't sure how the Autobots might view an anthropologist. As far as he could tell, the closest profession to anthropology they had was that of a spy, and Keller really didn't want to commit an offense on that scale if that was the case. For now his standing order for the Autobots' local liaisons to include any cultural information they picked up in the their their reports would have to suffice.

And thinking of reports -- their latest series of reports had been vague on certain points concerning this situation with Scoonok. They had done a very good job of implying that the didn't know anything further than what they'd said. Keller might have accepted that if it hadn't been for Captain Lennox's request for a private, unofficial meeting attached to the end of his.

Which was why Keller was sliding into a booth across from the captain in an otherwise empty diner.

Without being asked, the waitress brought a cup of coffee. As she retreated, the song on the anchient jukebox switched from the end of "Jingle Bell Rock" to the beginning of "Away in a Manger". Lennox looked over at it, bemused.

"So what was it you wanted to tell me, Captain?"

Lennox looked back to Keller. "Sir. There are somethings about the situation with Scorponok we all believe you need to be made aware of, but for various reasons do not want to be made official."

Keller remembered how vague Optimus Prime had been when telling him about Scorponok's defection. After the fact, he thought the vague had the feel of things left out for personal reasons, not a desire to be less than honest. "You're not...violating anyone's trust by telling me this, are you?"

Lennox grinned a bit. "No Sir. Optimus is one of the most adamant that you be informed, despite how sensitive he considers most of it.

So the truck outside wasn't here to prevent Captain Lennox from giving away secrets then. That was good. "Go on. We'll start with why Scorponok can't talk for himself." If Optimus's reluctance had stemmed from personal discomfort, that was probably the least sensitive.

"Well apparently that has to do with the nature of Decepticon drones -- which they didn't tell us because, as enemies, the differences between the types drones is negligible."

"You're quoting them, aren't you?"

"Yeah," he grinned, "I can't really explain it better than than Ratchet and Optimus did."

"Go on."

The captain's expression sobered. "The Autobots aren't sure how complete this information is. Drones didn't make an appearance until their war was well under way and both sides realized that smaller units would be better for infiltration and information gathering. The Autobots built smaller mechs like Bumblebee; the Decepticons built drones. As far as they know there are three types of drones -- a non-sentient kind that are used for simple tasks that don't need any sort of improvisation, and two sentient kinds. The closest translation for one kind of sentient drone is 'cassetticon'. Cassetticons are irrevocably linked to their masters, and their masters to them. But the use of cassetticons has fallen out of favor since their first appearance, because in the Decepticon view the drones have to be expendable and the depth of their bond with their master makes them anything but." He grinned again, briefly and a bit viciously. "A cassetticon was only expendable if it didn't belong to you." All amusement faded from his face. "There's only one active cassetticon team they're aware of. Frenzy was part of that team. His master and 'brothers' will be among the Decepticons coming here."

"But Scorponok's not a cassetticon."

"No Sir. One of the disadvantages of cassetticon units was that if the host 'Con was killed, the entire unit died. So the Decepticons built a new type of linked drone, one that's death wouldn't backlash on the host and the death of the host wouldn't automatically mean the death of the drone. They came up with two variations of linked drones, which are interchangeable as far as the Autobots have always been concerned. The difference is that one would eventually die without being bonded to a master and the other would not. Scorponok is one of the latter, but to encourage dependence he was constructed to be unable to communicate except through his link with his master."

"My God." Keller was appalled. It sounded fine, logical. Until he remembered that Lennox was describing people, not just machines. Then it was horrifying. The tightness around Lennox's eyes and the formality of his choice of words -- beyond that he was almost quoting the Autobots in some parts -- told him he felt the same. "The Autobots don't...construct drones, do they?"

"No, well yes...but that's a linguistic problem."

"Excuse me?"

"The Autobots do construct what we would call drones, but Ratchet says that they wouldn't be referred by as the same word as drones like Scorponok and Frenzy. They don't put sparks in theirs."

"Sparks?"

"Souls, Sir, and the programming for sentience." Lennox looked pained. Keller imagined he looked the same. It was one thing to say the words 'alien war' and quite another to think of all the horrors that might entail. Some of which, he was beginning to realize, not only didn't have human equivalents, but might not even translate adequately into a human language.

"So Scorponok defected to escape slavery under the Decepticons." That made sense. And he could partially understand Optimus Prime's reluctance to describe the specifics of the Decepticons' evil.

"Not...exactly, Sir." Lennox wouldn't look at him. "Scorponok, I don't think, really has a concept of the sides in the war. The Autobots were his master's enemies, not his own. As far as his actions went, they amounted to the same thing -- as long as his master was a Decepticon. So when Blackout was killed, he didn't so much defect as just do what he'd always done -- choose a new master."

"And he chose an Autobot. Which one?"

"Optimus."

Keller choked. "You're serious?"

Lennox nodded. "Optimus didn't accept. Scorponok's still a free drone, but he seems determined to hang around and act the part of Optimus's drone until he changes his mind about accepting."

Both men sat in silence and pondered that while the waitress came over and refilled both their coffees. Keller knew he'd need time to work out what everything meant. He was also thinking that there were things about this he'd probably never be able to wrap his brain around.

"So why doesn't Optimus Prime want this official?"

"Sir. Other than more personal reasons which Optimus won't talk about and Ratchet compares to family troubles, if the Decepticons found out Scorponok was not technically bonded to a master, they'd attempt to forcibly link to him. He's made it clear despite being unable to talk that there are few thing's he'd like less. So to protect him, they want Scorponok's status to be logged as 'drone attached to Optimus Prime' and nothing else to be said."

"I think we can do that. So how exactly did Scorponok approach the Autobots in the first place."

The captain laughed a bit and was still smirking when he answered. "He somehow managed to climb into the cab of Optimus's truck form and refused to come out. We don't know how he managed it -- Optimus refuses to tell, so apparently it's embarrassing."

Keller tried to imagine it. It must have made a funny picture, because Captain Lennox still looked as though he was trying not to laugh. Still he couldn't really picture it. 

"And why exactly is Ironhide parked out front?"

"Optimus ordered him to go away and come back when he thought he could control his temper. I had to come here to report, so we decided to make a road trip of it." He didn't look any less amused.

So the big, black Autobot weapon specialist whose presence had worried Keller so much was here because he was on time out. He shook his head. This was starting to get surreal. Or rather, more surreal. "Was that everything, Captain?"

"Yes Sir. Unless you had any more specific questions."

"No, I don't think so." For a moment he thought about the request he really wanted to make, before deciding just asking probably wouldn't be too much of an offense. "Could you find out how the Autobots would take having an anthropologist assigned to them?"

"Sure I could, Sir."

"Thank you. Good night, Captain Lennox."

"Good night, Sir."

Keller left. He had some paperwork, and a lot of thinking, to do.

 

 

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End file.
